| NEWS | Castle Mystery Vandals trashed a historic treasure in South Phoenix. BY KATYA SCHWENK B efore first light, someone broke into the historic Mystery Castle in South Phoenix and trashed it. When the property’s care- taker arrived the next morning, on Monday, March 7, he found extensive damage. Windows were shattered. Wood paneling had splintered and broken. Rooms were torn up, and decorations scat- tered on the ground. Since the incident, the small foundation that maintains the castle says it has seen an “outpouring” of support from the commu- nity. Neighbors have offered donations. Others have volunteered to help clean up. The exact cost of needed repairs is still unclear. But Linda Spears, vice president of the Mystery Castle Foundation, said that the “extensive” damage will be compli- cated to fix. And it will likely be expensive. “This is a historic building,” she said. “You don’t just go to a hardware store to buy replacement windows.” For more than 75 years, the Mystery Castle has sat in the foothills of South Mountain Park, at the end of East Mineral Road. The stone mansion’s whimsical architecture and touching history made it a beloved Phoenix landmark. It was desig- nated a city “point of pride” in 1992. The structure was built during the 1930s by Boyce Luther Gulley, who envi- sioned it as a castle for his daughter, Mary Lou. At the time, the story goes, Gulley was recovering from tuberculosis. He had left his family in Seattle. It was not until after Gulley’s death that Mary Lou saw the castle for the first time. She spent the rest of her life leading tours through the building. When she died, in 2010, she left the castle in the hands of a caretaker, Juan Gastelum Robles, and the Mystery Castle Foundation. The castle itself is strange and enchanting, built out of stone and scrap materials. The old building has 18 rooms, each painstakingly decorated with trinkets and art that Gulley and Mary Lou collected over the years. In the courtyard, there’s a wishing well. Yellow police tape lined the padlocked gates at the Mystery Castle’s entrance. From the road, little activity could be seen at the old building. Some children were hanging around the gates, speculating on how the vandals had managed to get inside. For now, the castle is closed to the 10 public, and no reopening date has been set. Phoenix police spent most of that Sunday investigating the damage. Ann A view of the Mystery Castle’s vandalized interior. Justus, a spokesperson for the department, told Phoenix New Times that there were no new updates in the investigation. No suspects have been identified. Spears said, though, she was hopeful that investigation would be fruitful. “The police believe they got some good evidence,” she said. “Enough evidence that if they catch someone they can defi- nitely prosecute.” In the past, Spears said, the only break- ins the castle has suffered were from people seeking shelter. This happened five years ago, she said, while the castle was closed for the summer. Occasionally, staff found graffiti. But things changed the first week of March when rocks were thrown through a window, Spears said. These incidents paled in comparison to the destruction that occurred days later. “Every door has basically been damaged, kicked through,” said Spears. “Windows [were] kicked out — not just broken glass but actually removing the casings.” Photos that the Phoenix police provided document the extent of the damage. Rooms were left in disarray. Shattered glass covered the cobblestone floors. The two-story porches at the front of the building will likely have to be entirely replaced, Spears said, due to damage. “It’s horrible,” she said. Given that nothing was stolen from the property, and discarded beer cans were found, Spears said she suspects that a group of people had broken in to drink and party. Because the building is so old, with rudimentary utilities and no phone line, there are no security cameras or alarms on the property that recorded them. For now, Spears said Phoenix Police Department she is working to support her staff. With the castle closed, the nonprofit’s only source of income — tours — has dried up. “They’ve taken away livelihoods from the people who work there,” she said. Once there’s a clear cost estimate for the cleanup, Spears plans to create a GoFundMe to recoup some of the costs. Though nothing is certain yet, Spears said she hopes to reopen the castle in late May, before it’s closed for the summer season. Neighbors are eager to help. The Mystery Castle, she said, was inundated with support from the community. One Phoenix resident, Kerry Koenig, was one. Koenig told New Times she was “devastated” to hear of what happened. She lives in west Phoenix but remem- bers her family visiting the castle for decades. Koenig has taken her own chil- dren and grandchildren there. “It’s been there for so long. People grew up with that story, with it being there,” she said. “There’s something about it that’s just captivating.” Koenig has offered to bring out her family and volunteer. But she worries that some parts of the castle will be unable to be restored — the quirky decorations and notes, sculptures, and art from Gulley’s travels. “It’s irreplaceable,” she said. High Flyer Moscow pot bust of Phoenix Mercury star raises awkward questions. BY ELIAS WEISS I t looks like the dab pens in basket- ball icon Brittney Griner’s duffel bag might have slipped her mind somewhere between Sky Harbor and Moscow’s main international airport, where she was arrested on drug smuggling charges late last month. Instead of toking up at the Valley’s lofty rooftop bars like Floor 13 and Orange Sky, the Phoenix Mercury star is accused of sneaking her cannabis cartridges up 40,000 feet in a carry-on bag last month. She could face up to 10 years in prison, according to Russian authorities. The Federal Customs Service of Russia, which classified the cannabis stash as a “significant amount,” said Griner will be detained while Russian law enforcement officials continue to investigate. Her case highlights conspicuous disparities between the U.S. and Russian legal systems, but also raises less obvious questions about gender fairness in basketball. The world’s biggest league treats men and women differently when it comes to their personal stash. Despite thousands of signatures on a Change.org petition to secure Griner’s swift and safe return to Arizona, U.S. lawmakers say it will be “very difficult” to liberate the basketball star from her jail cell in Russia. Drug-sniffing dogs flagged Griner on the New York-to-Moscow leg of the route to her seasonal home in Russia, where she has played for the EuroLeague’s UMMC Ekaterinburg since 2015. Griner’s team is alone atop the Russian Women’s Basketball Premier League standings entering the post- season starting on Tuesday. The WNBA season will resume in Phoenix in May and lasts until mid-August. Griner hopes to be a starter on the Mercury’s 2022 squad when she returns to Phoenix. If she returns. She might not be able. The U.S. State Department issued a “do not travel” advisory for Russia as the Kremlin continued to rain missiles down on Ukraine. 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